SWITCHGEAR MAINTENANCE

Switchgear Maintenance

Switchgear Maintenance

The maintenance function and technological change

Maintenance is 'work undertaken in order to keep or restore every facility, i.e. every part of a site, building and contents to an acceptable standard' (British Standards Institution, 1974). In plant engineering, maintenance is not only about preventing and fixing breakdowns, but also about improving the performance of the equipment. In other words, it is concerned with the immediate and long-term efficiency of the capital assets of the firm 'with the view to obtaining from these the best profit throughout their life' (Husband, 1986: 139). Maintenance is therefore a prominent issue in the whole life of the assets. Maintenance activities can be categorised into three types on the basis of when the work must be done: emergency, routine and preventative maintenance.

These activities embraces a number of what are too often thought about as discrete activities including: inspection, replenishing consumables, trouble shooting, removal and replacement/reinstallation, repair, adjustment/alignment, calibration, functional testing, refurbishing, and conditioning (Patton, 1980; Durkin, 1992). The nature of plant maintenance requirements varies according to the type and size of the organisation and the type of equipment to be maintained. Accordingly, the organisation of maintenance work and how the maintenance function is to be delivered take a number of forms and firms develop their own ways of organising maintenance work to suit their needs. Some have shift maintenance technicians providing 'immediate' maintenance service. Some are staffed only in day shifts with a call-out system to cover urgent maintenance needs. Some firms have a large maintenance department staffed with craftsmen of all trades. In some firms, a core maintenance team is employed supplemented by temporary contractors. In other firms, basic maintenance work (or first call maintenance), for instance, lubrication of the asset and its components is delegated to the operating staff. Still in other firms, especially the smaller ones, maintenance work may be carried out by operators, whereas there is a growing trend for larger firms to outsource their maintenance function. The organisation of maintenance resources for a fluctuating, fragmented and multitrade maintenance workload is a difficult managerial problem which involves a variety of decision-making processes. Partially because of that, the maintenance function is often regarded as a necessary evil, a non-core part of the business and is increasingly outsourced because firms may not want to develop the skills required nor the mess of maintenance. 'In firms, busy managers no longer want to worry about noncritical activities, even if the services could be performed equally as well in-house' (Porter, 1990: 244). According to a recent research on large companies in the recession period of the early 1990s, 'focus on core business' was an action considered very important by 54% of the firms surveyed (Geroski and Gregg, 1997). Outsourcing is even expanding into areas many of which were once considered core-functions by firms and carried out in-house. As Bosch et al. (2000: 108) noted, 'some very radical decisions are being made to outsource apparently central core ...